Parker made good on a two-year-old campaign promise in August when City Council approved her plan to give local companies an edge in competing for city contracts. The local firms can still win contracts even if they cost 3 percent to 5 percent more, depending on the amount of the contract and type of service.

One of Parker’s opponents, Dave Wilson, says she doesn’t practice what she preaches. On his campaign Web site, he claims:

Annise Parker’s is great at claiming to be creating jobs with taxpayer’s monies but when it comes to using her campaign money to create jobs here, what does she do? She sends half of it out of town.

I did a quick assessment of Wilson’s claim based on the mayor’s reported campaign expenses for July through September. And, indeed, she does a lot of outsourcing of her campaign.

I counted $274,000 in expenses to out-of-Houston firms, just over half of what her campaign spent during those three months.

But it’s hard to make a true estimation. I didn’t count the money sent to credit card companies and banks and phone companies. And some of the money the campaign sends out comes right back to Houston.

Take Storefront Political Media in San Francisco. It received more than $100,000 from Parker’s campaign in the last few months. But Storefront pays for the mailers touting Hire Houston First, most of which are printed in Houston, campaign spokeswoman Sue Davis said.

Lake Research does her polling. The D.C.-based company got more than $42,000. Rindy Miller of Austin got $53,000, much of it to make TV buys.

Davis explained that these firms have been with Parker since her days on City Council.

“If you have something that works, you stick with it,” Davis said. Plus, the principals in these firms become close friends, and Parker is very loyal, Davis explained.

And Storefront has a local connection. The firm’s Grant Martin has been with Parker since her first City Council campaign, when he lived in Houston. He moved to California as Parker continued at City Hall, and when he went West, so did the work he does for his client.

The current campaign manager, Ward Curtin, lives here but his checks are sent to Oklahoma, where he’s from. Davis said Curtin wanted to keep his hometown banking relationships, so it’s easier to send the money there even though Curtin is a local. Her social media director and finance director are hired guns from out of town, but they live here now and remain Houstonians after the election, Davis said.